DAVID BOWIE

David Bowie, who died [recently] aged 69, took conventional
notions of identity in pop and rock, already long-haired
and drug-addled after the 1960s, and hyper-blasted them into
orbit, creating an explosion of myriad shapes and possibilities.
He was a cultural figure who gave many souls in the 1970s
and beyond the permission to explore 'other selfs'; alternate
versions of themselves, not constrained by social norms.
Rather than perform as an 'authentic self', David Bowie,
through a number of concocted personas and striking
performance ambits and gestures, explored the outer reaches
of personal identity: male, female, weirdly normal, drugfucked,
spaceman, alien. In terms of Western popular culture
this was revolutionary.